


Let Me Get What I Want.

by Miku



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: Child Abuse, Dubious Morality, F/M, Grooming, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mind Manipulation, Pedophilia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-02
Updated: 2013-12-02
Packaged: 2018-01-03 05:41:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 20,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1066475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miku/pseuds/Miku
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[DISCONTINUED]</p><p>Long before Arthur had grown into his lanky-limbed, inward-footed and sluggish-paced adolescence, Eames had grown fond of him in the most self-loathing and inappropriate fashion.</p><p>He wasn't certain though, whether it had all begun in the night when he'd seen the boy for the first time; seated on the kitchen counter, feet dangling as he chewed on a bar of chocolate at three o'clock in the morning. His eyes had been droopy, his skin paled by midnight waking.</p><p>Or perhaps it had been the morning after.</p><p>That morning when Eames once more had regarded the boy in the kitchen. The sun had shined brightly despite the early hour; her glimmering rays penetrating glass. Windows no match to keep her warmth and light at bay.<br/>Arthur's pitch-black hair had been gleaming underneath her beams and a hint of flustered-pink had painted defined cheekbones.<br/>His mother had been the only aspect depriving the scenery's accessibility. However, the picture remained flawlessly alluring.</p><p>To this day, Eames continued being indefinite about the timing of when it had started.<br/>Nevertheless, truth being, it had happened and truth being, it shouldn't have.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Me Get What I Want.

Let Me Get What I Want.

 

_Good times for a change._

_See, the luck I've had can make a good man turn bad._

_So please, please, please_

_Let me, let me, let me_

_Let me get what I want this time._

 

_Haven't had a dream in a long time._

_See, the life I've had can make a good man bad._

_So for once in my life let me get what I want._

_Lord knows it would be the first time._

_Lord knows it would be the first time._

 

* * *

 

 

Introduction.

 

Long before Arthur had grown into his lanky-limbed, inward-footed and sluggish-paced adolescence, Eames had grown fond of him in the most self-loathing and inappropriate fashion.

 

He wasn't certain though, whether it had all begun in the night when he'd seen the boy for the first time; seated on the kitchen counter, feet dangling as he chewed on a bar of chocolate at three o'clock in the morning. His eyes had been droopy, his skin paled by midnight waking.

Or perhaps it had been the morning after.

That morning when Eames once more had regarded the boy in the kitchen. The sun had shined brightly despite the early hour; her glimmering rays penetrating glass. Windows no match to keep her warmth and light at bay.

Arthur's pitch-black hair had been gleaming underneath her beams and a hint of flustered-pink had painted defined cheekbones.

 

His mother had been the only aspect depriving the scenery's accessibility. However, the picture remained flawlessly alluring.

 

To this day, Eames continued being indefinite about the timing of when _it_ had started.

Nevertheless, truth being, it had happened and truth being, it shouldn't have.

* * *

 

Prologue.

_Summer, 2002_

 

The tale had begun six years prior. Arthur had only just entered his ninth summer and Eames already had lived twenty-five winters.

Eames was dating Rachael at the time. Rachael being Arthur's mother. Her beauty easily cloaked the austerity within.

They had been wooing one another for about three months before she put her mind into place and invited him over for a friendly shag in the appointed bedroom located inside her house. It wasn't that they had not taken part in sloppy, eager and hasty sex before. On the contrary, they'd committed quite a handful of frowned upon -if not illegal- acts in areas Eames did not feel comfortable to ever mention out loud within five miles of a police-station.

Point was; a woman in her thirties who'd put her husband in the ground only years prior to meeting a five-years-younger British charmer with whom she'd madly fall in love with some time in the future; was not likely to allow you in her house -her _home-_ where she'd be bare and vulnerable.

 

Having courted Rachael for an intense trimester would cause anyone to conclude that Eames was in love with her as much as she was with him. They'd assume their characters matched in a manner that would lead (inevitably) to 'rings on fingers' and 'delight-triggered tears behind a white veil'.

 

Not a thing was less true.

 

Now, Eames might be charming and his words may chime in honest fashion, but, Eames was not a man to wish upon any daughter or sister.

Eames appreciated pretty things. Rachael -being a five-foot-seven blonde stunner on legs that wouldn't quit and with breasts that'd distract anypair of eyes- was what Eames wanted at that moment.

Well. Eames _needed_ her, to preserve his denial and expand the time-stretch of his restrained desires.

It was only convenient, her beauty and eloquent nature, to have parade at his arm. (Preferably in the presence of impatient -if not needy- family members who were starting to question Eames' sexuality after he'd only brought home two girls in the past _seven years._ )

 

And if only it'd be that simple. Eames had prayed for other sexualities, had begged whomever was up there to please, _please_ , make him a good man with a keen eye for females. Or even males... Legally-aged males.

 

Regretfully enough, praying worked no more than shoving a woman off a cliff with the prospect she'd fly to an escape if she were a witch, fall to her death if she was human. Eames had never grasped the logic behind this historic happening.

But then, he did feel like the witch; getting a second chance he should not be granted, over and over again. He never fell to his death, he never cracked open his skull and have the sick spirits escape his mind.

 

He'd always escaped.

Eames had dodged more metaphorical bullets than the collection of cans at a fair-stand, being aimed at by children who could not even hold up the forged weaponry above shoulder-height without the help of a parent. And then still, magnets and trickery would mislead the iron-pellet's path.

 

This put aside, Rachael was convenient, distractive, and her alluring looks rose above current society's beauty-standards.

Rachael, as well, bless her soul, was absolutely head over heels for Eames. That's why Eames chose to date her more attentively than he'd done before with other women. Eames needed a fix. He wanted, deeply and fully, for Rachael to become his only drug and to get him off the other; which was far more ugly and destructively carnage.

He wanted to drown in her as much as she did in him. He wanted to be blind-guided by love such as she was; unseeing for his flaws, soaking in his charm.

 

But then, this was before he'd found out that Rachael, during their three-month relationship, had conveniently forgotten to mention she had a nine-year old son.

* * *

 

_Spring, 1996_

 

_Their bodies crashed together against the door which Eames had just recently kicked shut behind him._

_With their mouths slotted together and hands roaming anywhere they could reach; Eames still claimed enough of his senses to note that her house smelled of her. There was, though, a sweeter and lighter touch to the scent which granted him a bit of a less heady sting in his nostrils (which had been caused by Rachael's smothering, feminine perfume)._

_Eames, inevitably, could not stop the lightning-fast thought from smacking him against the back of his head, inside-out._

 

_'Boys never smell this chemically toxic and offensively whorish._

_They scent of poppy flowers and heated skin.'_

 

_That thought alone made him grind harder against the woman he'd pressed up the wall by now._

 

“ _Turn around.” Eames commanded in a hoarse whisper. Rachael whined but obeyed, spinning around and placing her manicured hands against flowery wallpaper. She looked over her shoulder immediately and Eames grabbed a fistful of her loose hair, twisting it around his wrist and tugging. With a gasp her head tilted back, eyes now focused on the ceiling above, which Eames himself had not yet inspected for cobwebs or leaks which would discard her perfect, hygienic image._

 

_Taking a break from grinding every inch of her he could get a hold of, Eames reached down with his free hand. His movements were feverish and clumsy when he pulled up her skirt, tutting at her when he was met by a naked arse rather than a set of frilly knickers._

_Rachael chuckled._

 

“ _You're a wee bit naughty, aren't you?” Eames whispered into her ear, his chest leaning heavily against her back, crushing her against the wall. English-tongued words were bound to drive her mad as she suffered from a bad case of Englishmen-fetishism. 'T was very handy, though._

 

“ _Yes, yes I am.” Rachael gasped, her hips rolled back and Eames looked down at the tanned cheeks rutting against the bulge in his trousers._

_He slapped her once, having her yelp before it turned into a more stirring, lewd sound._

_Eames didn't like how even her arse was bronzed by spending a whole lot of time and a shit-ton of money on lying like a roasted turkey underneath bright blue lights which screamed 'danger-of-growing-cancer' even if you would not know it could cause mentioned illness._

 

_The red mark of his hand was barely showing._

 

“ _Hurry up.” Rachael hissed and Eames took the impatience as an excuse to loosen the grip on her hair and press her forehead and tip of nose against the wall._

 

_He liked it like this._

_Eames preferred the quick, wild fucks with her. Eames preferred to have her turned around or over (a desk, table, chair, counter). He did not enjoy, one bit, when they'd have sex eye-to-eye. Not only was it obnoxious to see her breasts bounce and her eyes darken with **more** than just lust, but he feared she could somehow see it in him._

 

_What if, one day, a woman would be able to tell who and **what** Eames was? It must be showing, in his eyes, it must be showing in his aggression, his dominance.  
But so far not a single female had mentioned a thing about his specific taste for intercourse. They all seemed to enjoy it thoroughly for some reason. They did not at all question how he'd shut them up. He didn't want to hear the mewl and lilt of the female voice, let alone the words 'pussy' or worse; 'knock me up'. Granted, the latter he'd only heard once when shagging a rather feisty red-head back in Manchester._

 

_Eames unbuckled and then shoved himself inside of her without preamble. The groan that left her lips was disgustingly sultry and it trembled along with her body. Eames could feel the shudder through the points he was holding her; on the nape and the hip._

 

_This, he could do._

_Whilst resting the front of his head against the back of hers, he grabbed both mounds of flesh into his hands, kneading and rubbing her arse and thanking heavens it was tight and small and not that female-like if you tried hard enough to deny her gender._

 

_Inside she was hot and wet. Wet in a different way than lubricant up a hole would be like. But it was close enough. He could do this._

 

_Eames' friends envied him for bedding with Rachael and his family cooed when noting he had her passport-picture in his wallet (which he'd only done to avoid another belittling argument with the touchy missus. She was outstandingly easy to agitate)._

_His parents, well, they were finally letting the black-sheep-of-a-son complaint slide, which was impressive when Eames had a brother who'd been married for four years, spawned a two-year old girl with his picture-perfect wife (though, by far was not as good-looking as Rachael), and worked as a top-notch lawyer back in London._

 

_Eames did not like his brother. And that's putting it kindly._

 

_It took Eames another two minutes of squeezing his eyes shut, grinding his teeth and imagining the filthiest things he could be -and had been- doing to young boys and then spilled release._

_Rachael sighed leisurely when they both leaned against the wall, bodies spent and weighty. Apparently she'd gotten herself off in the meanwhile -thankfully enough- and Eames was unsuccessful at feeling guilty for purposefully having done horribly at manually pleasuring her in the past. It had only taken him five failures before Rachael had gone ahead and taken matters 'in own hand'. And it had maintained in that manner._

 

_It was ruthlessly paradoxical to feel sick to the stomach when laying hands on female privates but then experience the gut-wrenching thrill when touching boys, even if only on the shoulder._

 

“ _Seems like we still didn't get to my bed.” Rachael muttered. Her voice was strained and Eames seized a moment to come back to his senses and then removed his bulk from her lean frame._

 

“ _So it appears.” He blankly returned, pushing off of her and the wall before tucking himself in._

_When turning around he nearly tumbled into his well-deserved premature death through stepping on something hard but dauntingly mobile. Eames' nature was that of a scallywag and along with this came fishily well-developed reflexes. Assumably by hand of the thieving genes from his ancestors._

_Nevertheless, he prevented himself from tripping, with a hand slammed against the wall and balancing on the foot not currently being shanked to death by the sharp object._

 

“ _Bloody knob-head.” Eames grumbled with a scowl, going to pick up the culprit which had been set on shoving Eames towards an early commitment with his grave._

 

“ _I-I'm sorry. I was going to tell you, I swear! There just didn't seem to be a right time for it and-” Rachael's voice drowned out by the ringing in Eames' ears._

 

_In his hand lied a miniature car (a 1970's Ford Mustang Boss 302, to be precise). It was colored a bright red with black highlights on the tiny hood. Paint had scraped off at a few corners, possibly over-used by the player's impetuousness._

 

_She had a kid?_

 

_Glancing over his shoulder at the woman who was still waving about her hands, mouth opening and closing with words Eames could not yet comprehend, his heart dropped into his stomach._

 

“ _You've a child?” He hoarsely questioned. A great part of Eames wanted for her to tell him 'no' and allow him to continue on his path of mind-soothing, half-arsed redemption._

_A greater part of Eames desired for her to tell him 'yes' and unknowingly allow him to slither into their safety haven, spew toxic and devour what would become the cause of his insatiable hunger._

 

_Rachael nodded, wide-eyed, flustered guilt kissing the skin on her cheekbones._

 

“ _Fuck... Rachael.” Eames groaned and squeezed the toy into his white-knuckled fist. With his other hand rubbing over his face -traveling a shaky path over his scalp- he gazed at his girlfriend._

 

“ _I'm sorry.” She whispered and Eames only groaned more._

 

“ _You should've told me. From the start, Rachael. Not now. Not after three sodding months.”_

 

“ _I know. I'm just... I really like you, Eames. I didn't- I don'twant to lose you.”_

 

_With a huff Eames leaned against the wall with his shoulder, both hands fumbling with the car, caressing dents and scrapes._

_He looked at her and she returned the gaze with a lifted chin._

 

_This was his cue, wasn't it? This was the moment the curtains got drawn, the spotlight dimmed and it was time for Eames to withdraw from the stage, leave the play behind._

_He should not maintain, neither in her presence or her home. Definitely not her home._

_Eames did not love Rachael, failed to even be **in** love with her and this on itself would be reason enough for any man to turn on his heels and flee the obligations of raising a -as good as- clean-slated human being along with a specimen he could -honestly- survive without._

 

_There was little chance the child was a female (did there exist little girls who preferred lip-trilling engine-sounds and 'driving' miniature cars over carpet, tiles and furniture?) and even less likely it was below the age of seven or above ten. Besides... Rachael's thirty winters could not have been spawning an infant longer than ten years ago. Save from the meager possibility of teenage pregnancy having occurred._

 

_Eames narrowed his eyes at the thought of a fourteen-year-old brute of a smelly, hormonal, adolescent boy._

_He shivered._

 

“ _A boy then?” Eames questioned carefully, forcing back any intonation of hopefulness.  
Predictably, Rachael translated the question to that of being harmless curiosity for her own flesh and blood._

 

“ _Yes. Turned nine a couple of weeks ago... He's-uh, he's very well-behaved and easy in handling.” She added eagerly and Eames could **hear** the gears in her little brain work. They spun and turned and squeaked just in order to assure Eames that her son was not going to be a problem for continuing their relationship with one another._

 

_Reality contrasted morosely harsh with that assumption._

 

“ _I wanted to tell you. But our relationship got so serious so fast... I was afraid.” Her narrowed focus on the bond between them held different reasoning than Eames' looser and wider view on it._

_You see, truth, as much as beauty, lied within the eye of the beholder._

 

_Eames' mind appeared to have been swiped clean at that exact moment. Not a pure cleanliness, mind you. But a stuttering halt that had everything thrown off the wagon by the abrupt stop, and it took him far too long to go and pick everything up and get back on the tracks._

 

“ _Now what am I supposed to do with this information, hm?” Eames frowned and reached out the toy towards her. Rachael hesitated and her eyeballs seemed to wobble with the speed in which they tried so desperately to read Eames' features._

_Unlike her, Eames benefited the talent of mastering facial expressions. Surely this gift had been passed on by the same ancestors who'd been notorious bandits. Anyhow, now was the perfect setting to keep his face void of emotion. Blank._

 

“ _William, please.” She whispered._

_Eames despised his first name for reasons he was not comfortable to remember, let alone share. In any case, Rachael threw out the W-word whenever angry or desperate, the latter of which seemed to be the occasion that night._

_It was evident that she believed that when accepting the toy from Eames' out-reached hand, he'd flee out the door and never reappear. It was visible that she feared and mistook a miniature car for being an improvised parting-gift._

 

_But Eames' consciousness had gotten back on the tracks and joy-rode towards a new destination... a target._

_Envisioning what **they** could become. Rachael, Eames and the boy... The finger-licking fantasy alone was enough of a justification to throw overboard reasoning, conscience and selflessness._

 

_The only hope left was that her son would be ugly. Ugly and overly chubby. Perhaps crook-toothed and always with snotty nose, if the few morals within his mind were to be lucky. His body on the other hand, dearly wished for the boy not to be anything but Eames' wet dream.  
And judging from Rachael's flawless looks; his moral-depraved brain could say goodbye to the days of desperately attempting to repent and deny all that was so wrong but felt **so** bloody good._

 

“ _His father?” Eames asked after he'd sensed that having given Rachael the silent treatment for two minutes straight was enough to cause her believes to be swapped from the possible 'this man is upset because he found out I have a nine-year old boy he desires to fondle whenever I'm out the house' to the more desired 'this man is upset because I kept a secret from him'._

 

_She picked the petite Mustang from his hand and cradled it with hers._

 

“ _He is gone. Passed away three years ago. Car-crash.” The blue in her irises seemed to enhance their brightness when teary-eyed. Her lips moved hastily when Eames did not reply or show any sign of empathy._

 

“ _I-I'm over it, though. And so is he. He's a wonderful child, truly, he is.” There were at least two lies in the tactless sentences she had formed. The actuality that she went out of her way in order to persuade Eames into staying at her side was as shady as it was handy._

_Her American heart, bless it, desired to thump for an Englishman. Rachael was, undoubtedly, smitten for him._

_And Eames was, undeniably, diving headfirst into the biggest mistake of his life._

* * *

 

In that same night Rachael had convinced Eames to spend the night. Not one of those 'shag in the bed, leave the bed around three in the morning, carrying your shoes and tiptoeing down the stairs and away from responsibilities' kind of night.

No, it was the whole sodding timespan inbetween sex and breakfast.

And had it not been for his perversion-led curiosity, Eames was fairly sure he'd have bluffed his way out. It was one thing to date, 't was a whole other to share nights together in each other's arms, sharing stories about old lovers and your favorite films.

 

Nonetheless, the worse had gotten the better of him and so Eames _had_ agreed. And Eames _had_ fucked her more thoroughly than he'd ever had before. And all this solely because he'd been aware of there being a young, beautiful boy sleeping in a pair of little knickers present on the same floor.

 

And bloody hell, he _was_ beautiful.

 

Rachael had pointed out a few recent photographs of her son when they'd walked up the wooden staircase. The bold flower-print on the wallpaper blanched alongside the silver framework accentuating the boy's black and white pictures.

Eames' gut had seemed to have gotten left at the bottom of the stairs, it had dropped that heavily when noting that Rachael's son was a proper stunner. His insides had remained on the ground-floor for most of the night and it'd been nearly impossible to inhale a deep enough breath for him to recollect his patience and self-discipline.

 

The climb to the first floor had by far not lasted long enough. Other than the boy's name ( _Arthur._ Rolled off the tongue real smooth), Rachael had not shared anything more about him. And Eames would've been a fool to display the curious enthusiasm that seethed within.

Eames had preferred to question more about the nine-year old. Suchlike, what his favorite classes were, when his birthday occurred and which kinds of sweets he liked best.

 

The latter of those would've been conspicuous to ask a mother about her child. Yet, ironically enough, that query would be replied to that same night. 

* * *

 

 

_Eames awoke within the presence of a dry mouth and a prodding ache behind his eyeballs._

_Disorientation rose to the surface only moments later when he opened his eyes and observed a dark room he did not recognize. And then memory restored into the shape of pictures burnt on retina._

 

_Arthur._

 

_He peeked over his shoulder and witnessed an asleep Rachael; mouth wide open and snorts gurgling either from her nose or the back of the throat._

_Eames frowned to himself; 'Always the pretty ones' and then repressed memories of ladies he'd dated who'd been keen to the eye but in actuality as unhygienic as a lapdog owned by an elderly couple. Or as tastelessly tactless as the chavs back in London's dodgy neighborhoods._

 

_Eames moved up and off the mattress which held more similarities to a giant, platinized brick than it did a welcoming wave of dents to disintegrate his spine for eternity and beyond... At least he would've been comfortable, though._

 

_There wasn't a way out, anymore. Neither out of her house or out of her life._

_Surely his vertebrae already had collapsed underneath the weight of guilt and spite, metaphorically that is. Eames was not a strong man when it came to his wants and needs and somewhere along the line of aging; his sexuality had been left behind in his childhood._

_Albeit by now, it went hand in hand with the fleshly debauchery that only a twenty-five year old could sprout._

 

_His perception on regret and abstinence wobbled at the top of a pillar bricked by benevolence. And the more Eames aged, the more it perished from repent._

_More often than not, Eames encountered uncanny lacks of morality. The difficulty he found in feeling remorseful for his mal-intended desires only increased over the years. At his twenty-fifth, Eames was aware he'd given up on fighting **it** and would soon open his eyes fully to see what he really was. To embrace who he really was._

 

_'T was merely a matter of time._

 

_Leaving the trophy-girlfriend in her bed, Eames dressed himself in his pair of jeans and white teeshirt which were strewn about on the floor._

 

_Even when convinced that the dark -and not his clumsiness- was the cause of having stubbed his toe against the armoire's leg; Eames still directed a colorful string of English-laced insults to himself. And it was only after the fifth 'wanker' that he recalled the presence of another human being in the room._

 

_Gingerly, Eames casted a glance over his shoulder._

_Rachael, comically enough, was still asleep with her limbs sprawled out in such manner it reminded Eames of a starfish. Or an emotionally clingy octopus._

 

_Now, it was not his intention at all to walk out into that hallway and surge towards Arthur's bedroom door, open it and then crawl into bed with him. As appealing as that thought may be, that would just not do, now would it?_

_Eames only wanted to drink some water and get rid of the sand-paper scrape on the back of his tongue._

 

_Leaving the bedroom, closing the door behind him, Eames stopped in his tracks. He hadn't the slightest of which door in the dark hallway led to a bathroom consisting -desirably- a running faucet. The mere thought of what would happen if he were to open the wrong door and be faced with Arthur's beauty (asleep and vulnerable), caused Eames to choke on an inhale. He turned to his right and with strained lungs paced determinately towards the staircase._

 

_Kitchen._

_He knew where the kitchen was._

 

_With unusually sweaty palms and a trembling nerve somewhere on an eyelid; he descended. The farther he traveled from Arthur's room, the easier it became to breathe. It was only when he reached the ground-floor that it occurred to him he'd not broken his neck on the unfamiliar steps, and the reason for this was because there'd been light to illuminate his climb down._

 

_Eames gazed at the unlatched kitchen-door to his left and then traveled his eyes lower. The light that seeped through the crevice beneath, reflected gently on the dark wooden floorboards and dimmed to a soft-brown blur the closer it reached Eames' bare feet._

 

_It seemed to beckon him. Which was a ridiculous thought, obviously, but nevertheless alluring enough to convince him._

_He listened to the sounds coming from behind the ajar door whilst he stood still and stared unseeingly at his toes in the light. He heard a cabinet open and close, and then the soft pats of bare feet on cold tiles. Then nothing for a few seconds in which Eames caught himself on not breathing and listening so closely his ears hummed at the effort._

 

_He should turn around._

_He **knew** it was Arthur in that kitchen. It couldn't be anyone else. Eames should definitely retreat and vanish._

 

_The rustle of paper (coated with aluminum, as far as Eames could tell) made him hesitate to take that step forwards. But then silly excuses came to mind._

_'It could be a burglar' or 'I really won't be able to sleep if I don't drink' or 'Arthur will never be as dazzling as he is on his photographs' or his personal favorite; 'you'll be fine, Eames'._

 

_Eames stepped forwards, then took a deep breath, swiped the palms of his hands on his trousers and opened the door._

 

_With eyes focused on the floor -watching it go from wooden boards to ceramic tiles- Eames entered the cuisine._

_He didn't look up straight away, didn't want to be confronted with 'all of the boy' before he'd taken in every inch of him -one by one- and would be granted enough time to 'get over'every inch._

 

_Little feet with tiny toes and ridiculously-feminine ankles were the first sight of Arthur he consumed, and Eames was certain that if he'd be granted to see his naked feet at any given time in the future, it'd always cause him to recall this night._

_Arthur's feet halted for a split second, pausing in their playful sways with heels thumping against the bottom cabinet. Said split second appeared to stretch a lifetime for Eames. After all, what if Arthur would startle? What if he'd shout and dash up the stairs to tell his mum there was a scary man downstairs who'd been meaning to harm him._

_Eames did not wantto harm him._

_Yet he would-inevitably- come to harm him with his greedy hands and a mouth whispering words that'd scramble Arthur's young brain 'round and 'round until it suited the man's every wish and desire. Until Arthur would be ready, for him._

_He didn't mean to, though. Not really. It was just that making love to a child unfortunately enough scarred mentioned infant. But it wasn't his intention... Abuse was never Eames' motivation to do the things he did, and thus it was justified. Period._

 

_Arthur's feet thumped anew against the cabinet's brownish door and the sound of rustling paper picked its volume back up. Amongst this, Eames' eyes roamed farther north while he closed the door quietly, and slowly, behind him._

 

_There was a great absence of hair on Arthur's legs and even above his knobby knees, on his thighs, there was barely a dusting of fuzz to be found. The cotton boxers were of a dark color and this contrasted appealingly with his pale skin. Eames noted that some parts of the shorts were wrinkled and bunched up because Arthur had scooted his arse up the counter-top and hadn't bothered sorting himself out._

 

_The boy's waist -which undoubtedly must be narrow and tight- was yet to be revealed for Eames' shrewd eye. Instead he'd have to be satisfied with the teeshirt Arthur was wearing; two sizes too large and sagging off one bony shoulder._

_Its print was of a yellow cartoon character, above which it said in bright-red, capitalized letters; 'EAT MY SHORTS'. Eames, for a moment, could not decide whether to laugh or cry so instead he optioned to remain calm on the outside and disregard the pained manic giggle in his conscious. The irony, undoubtedly, was not lost on him._

 

_With collarbones as sharp as his elbows, Eames was convinced there did not exist a more perfectly built child than this one._

_Arthur's long throat worked around whatever it was that he was swallowing down. A glance up showed it was a candy-bar. The wrapping rustled when Arthur brought up a hand to tug it down a bit farther so he could take another bite and his fingers were long and lean and not at all 'nine-year-old-chubby'. Eames ached when comprehending the taunting fact that the boy's wrists were as femininely bony as his ankles._

 

_He stroked a hand over his stomach, pathetically trying to urge down the carnal desire. It didn't work, not much, nevertheless Eames could feast upon sight alone for months if he needed to. He wasn't daft enough to jump Arthur at that exact moment._

 

_Eames reconsidered the jumping part when finally resting his gaze on the boy's features._

 

_Arthur was what they called 'a natural beauty'. As cliché and sappy it may sound, it still remained the truth._

_Almond-shaped eyes were large and dark as they burned through Eames' bloody soul. For an irrational second he believed Arthur would see right into him, into his brain where the little black room of his perversions had grown bigger and bigger over time until it seemed to have swallowed his whole mind and then shrink its walls to crush his conscience._

_Preposterous, of course._

_Yet, those eyes still held more awareness than they should at this innocent age. They **pierced**._

 

_It was the fuzziness of sleep that softened the edges of his features. His skin was pale, maybe even paler than that of his thighs, nevertheless a light blush lingered on his high cheekbones. He had prominent bone-structure hidden underneath the chubbiness of his cheeks and then lower...  
Eames gulped down a groan when witnessing Arthur's uncommonly-yet-delightfully arched lips, curved into a shape which could only be described as Cupid's Bow. A deep red painted them more temptingly than any lip-stick ever could and as they wrapped around the chocolate candy-bar, well, Eames could not grasp how any man would not grow aroused at the sight, no matter their age..._

 

_With a careless air Eames walked closer towards Arthur, who still watched him with big, unreadable eyes._

_He let his fingers stroke a path over the (false) marble-top as he made way towards the boy who'd seated himself on the farthest corner of the counter._

_The closer he got, the more Arthur's eyes needed to raise to maintain his sight on Eames' face. For some reason he did not tilt his chin, perhaps because he enjoyed his candy too much, or less likely because he was just a very subdued child. Those blown pupils screamed anything **but** submissiveness. _

 

_Eames came to a halt in front of him, leaned a hand on the counter and with his other reached out to open an overhead cabinet.  
Arthur looked up, but kept munching on the bar and then aimed his view back at Eames' face._

 

_Eames found a glass after a second of intentionally fumbling around, just to stay within close proximity of Arthur. Their eyes met for a second and he threw him a cheeky grin. Arthur replied with cocking one eyebrow before he finally looked away, blushing at the confrontation._

 

_Oh, Eames was already lost._

 

“ _You like Snickers?” He asked Arthur and in the meanwhile filled the glass with water underneath the silver faucet. The question was silly, harmless, odd to be the first words spoken to Arthur who Eames knew would be the downfall of him, if only he'd be so lucky._

 

_The boy hummed, obliging Eames to glance at him before he focused back on the water pouring into the glass. The splattering stream chimed loudly in his ears, but then, at this moment he could even hear his own skittish heartbeat._

 

“ _I like Bounties more.” Arthur shared after Eames had taken a few gulps from his drink. The man leaned a hip against the counter, crossing his ankles as well as his arms. To make sure his mouth would not spew confessions of wanting to ravish him, he rested the rim of the glass against his lower lip, prepared to bite it when necessary._

 

“ _Coconut's a rather peculiar taste, is it not?” He asked him and could tell by the flicker in his eyes that he did not understand what Eames had said. Pride, rather than shyness, was the reason he did not ask Eames to clarify the question._

 

“ _Yeah.” Arthur muttered and Eames' heart skipped a beat at the lovely American lilt to the word._

 

_When Arthur stroked a strand of pitch-black hair behind the shell of his ear (which honestly stuck out too far and was absolutely adorable) Eames was not sure if this was because he felt self-conscious or because he desired to draw Eames' attention._

 

“ _Are you mom's new boyfriend?” Arthur asked without preamble. His hazel eyes locked with Eames' gray ones in a brave attempt to feign his confidence. Eames, on the other hand, could not stop himself from leering over the glass when swallowing down the remainder of water and then have his gaze stutter upon Arthur's hair._

_Even without the cowlicks and sleep-ruffled touch to his black curls, Eames suspected his hair to be a proper mess most of the time. The image was alluring and then the image got heated when he thought of his fingers stroking through the thick strands._

_Eames wanted desperately to find out what he smelled like and how he felt like. Wanted to know what kind of sound he'd make were he to tug at his curls._

 

“ _What do you reckon?” Eames asked with a mischievous smile and a slow blink which made Arthur blush and simultaneously caused him to lift his chin. For a horrifying split second it reminded him of Rachael._

_Lean fingers fumbled with the empty candy-wrapper and for a long moment there was only the crackling sound to lighten the silence. Eames tried hard to not stare at him and inevitably have him grow suspicious if not uncomfortable. It wasn't easy, though._

 

_Disposing the glass in the sink to his left, Eames uncrossed his arms and ankles and started to initiate his exit. Arthur straightened immediately, reminding Eames that the body's language told you more than the oral one. And then, merciless for Eames' libido, he pulled up a leg on the counter to bend it more comfortably. He scooted the foot underneath his thigh and then held his shin with both hands._

 

_It was only thanks to sheer self-control that Eames managed to not lower his eyes to the boy's spread leg._

 

“ _What's your name?” He asked when Eames motioned to turn to the door at his right. His heart leaped and he nearly felt it pulsate on the back of his tongue, which, even after a full glass of water, was still dry and thick with words he wanted to breathe into one of Arthur's sticky-out ears.  
Arthur showed interest. Not just curiosity, but interest. Eames was convinced he was not imagining things._

 

“ _Eames.” He curtly shared and with a heavy stomach watched Arthur nibble on the inside of his lower lip._

 

“ _Your name's as strange as your accent. Do you know mine?”_

 

“ _I do.” Eames whispered conspiratorially, delighted when Arthur's dark eyes narrowed skeptically._

 

“ _Arthur, innit?” Amongst a voice lingered with false mellowness; Eames brushed his fingers over the counter, making it seem he was distracted and placid. Honestly though, he just found thrill within having his fingers spider-walk close to Arthur's thigh. The boy didn't stir, didn't pull away, and his eyes remained focused on Eames' features._

 

_His fearlessness along with childish curiosity, was a superb cocktail to ooze him into grooming._

 

“ _You're my mom's boyfriend, then. Mom doesn't tell strangers my name.” Arthur claimed with a tiny scowl creasing the skin between his eyebrows._

 

“ _She doesn't?” Eames asked with wide eyes and cocked his head a bit to the right. Arthur's subconscious caught up with Eames' curious and receptive body-language. The boy was quick on the uptake._

 

“ _Nope.” He shrugged, then looked down and Eames watched his fingers squeezing the flesh of his calf._

 

“ _Does it bother you that I'm her boyfriend?” Eames queried Arthur and Arthur -damn his stunning beauty and beautiful voice- looked Eames over, once, with a mischievousness which should not be present amongst his age._

 

_Swiftly, Arthur hopped off the counter before grabbing something behind him and then turning back to Eames._

_He shrugged in careless manner, which the flustered skin on his cheeks betrayed._

 

“ _Nah... You're cool.” He mumbled and then reached out a Snickers bar to him._

 

“ _Why thank you, Arthur.” Eames smiled, bowing and tipping an imaginary hat before he took the candy from him, making sure their fingers did **not** touch. Arthur snorted in a manner which could either be amusement or vicarious embarrassment and then exited the kitchen with a lithe -yet hasty- bounce to his feet._

 

_Eames did not watch him go. Eames wasn't sure he'd survive the sight of his nape, shoulders, back, arse and his long, **long** legs. Arthur was built like a gymnast; slender, supple and elegant._

 

_Their first meeting had been good..._

_'More than good' Eames added as he looked down at the candy-bar in his hand, ignoring the boil in his blood and the heat in his groin._

 

_After all, the boy had given Eames something he himself enjoyed, he'd handed Eames a present only fifteen minutes into meeting him._

_If Eames had learned one thing in the years of living in pained secrecy and shameful perversions, it was that; a child cherished its candy and a child which -nonetheless- shared it with you, was a child which would pay off in the end._

* * *

 

Eames had undertaken an attempt to flee that same night. He'd experienced a struggle with himself, one part of which shouted at him to leave _now_ , just dodge this bullet before it would be fired and get out of that tempting hell-hole. And he'd had the opportunity to, with Rachael fast asleep and not a single aspect in their relationship which should bind him to her.

Yet, another part of himself begged and pleaded for him to stay. Contradiction had a proper laugh as it whispered at Eames that Arthur would be gorgeous; spread out on dark sheets with half-lid eyes and a needy whine crawling from between parted lips. And then right after it urged that it would be alright; Eames would be able to never touch Arthur, Eames wouldn't abuse _this_ child. He was strong enough for _this one_. There was no reason whatsoever to not continue his relationship with Rachael and hence stay within reach of the boy.

 

Thus there he went; on a ruthless roller-coaster, reaching higher peaks than Eames would ever have hoped for and then sear so low -so quickly- that he wondered if the whole ride had even be worth it.

 

Pathetically enough, he knew the answer to that because it had remained the same ever since he'd stepped with both feet onto the road which was not only paved with blindness but as well framed with pleasure and pain.

The answer, indubitably, was a well-rounded 'yes'. 

* * *

 

 

_The whisper of his name was the only warning that alerted him to not jump when warm fingers wrapped around his wrist._

_He stood next to Rachael's bed, waiting with a heart pounding so vigorously that it seemed it would burst through his ribcage at any moment. And again there that fear was. What if she could see it on him? Smell it on him?_

_Though the room was dark and Rachael should not be able to witness more than the contours of his shape, Eames' throat still wrapped itself into a tight knot. Could she feel his rapid pulse in the wrist she was holding? Could she feel the heat of his skin, smell the sweat of guilty arousal?_

_It was very much a possibility that Arthur had come up here straight after leaving Eames alone in that kitchen. After all, he had stood there, staring at the candy-bar in his hand for a whopping ten minutes before he realized what a bloody tosser he was being. Still, he'd pocketed the Snickers before ascending the stairs._

 

“ _What is it?” Eames asked softly, as much proud as relieved that his voice didn't so much as tremble even with the fluttering nerve-endings causing his tongue to feel like a slab of useless meat in the dry cavern of his mouth._

 

“ _Stay the night?” The question seemed to waver on a sigh. It was evident she was already tipping back into slumber._

 

“ _Yeah, of course, Love, of course.” He muttered before tugging his wrist carefully from her grasp._

 

“ _I told you I would.” Eames added and then rounded the bed, undressed and crawled back under the sheets._

 

_That night he did not close an eye. With a throat choking up and lungs constricted, Eames felt he'd tumble into lifelessness were he to shut his eyelids for a mere few seconds._

_Besides, his masochistic mind did not want to forget about Arthur and instead replayed what had occurred, here and there adding extra details of what could've happened if Eames had pressed. Had he caged him in that corner on the counter, had he stepped in between his spread legs and brushed those messy curls from his forehead... what could've happened?_

 

_Three years ago was the last time Eames had come across a boy he'd been able to swoon and touch with hands that held no other promise but a life-time of psychological trauma. Nevertheless, he had never, **ever** , met such an intriguingly angelic beauty as Arthur._

 

_The fact that there were endless possibilities to infiltrate his mind only added to his flawlessness. Children, to Eames, had always been bit of strangers._

_Eight-year old Jake had been living above Eames' apartment in London. Jake had been fatherless and simply head-over-heels with the 'stranger who sometimes would ask his mum for a cup of sugar and throw him a cheeky wink over her shoulder'. He had had an ignorant mother._

_And then Jake, on a summer afternoon, had returned to his home after a tiresome day of school only to find his mum was at work for another couple of hours while he himself had foolishly 'lost' his key. (Eames still had this key somewhere shoved into a book of his'. He liked to steal little things from 'his boys' -which he refused to call victims- and keep them as trophies and memoirs.)_

_Blue-eyed Jake had turned to the only grown-up he could reach without having to travel half the city. Eames had opened his door after the knock, with a worried frown and a soothing hand to brush a shoulder._

_They'd kissed for what had seemed like hours on Eames' sofa. And with a mother who'd allow an eight-year old to walk the twenty-minute walk to-and-from school every single day, **alone** ; Eames had not needed to put much effort into convincing Jake that his mum either would not care or simply grow angry with him if he shared what had happened._

 

_Jake had been Eames' first. The first boy he'd done more with than just touch prudishly._

_Eames had been eighteen at the time._

 

_There had followed many more 'Jake-like boys' in 'Jake-like scenarios', but Eames had never known them inside-out. Eames had been impatient and had taken many risks with touching boys too much too soon into the grooming process. Nonetheless, such as he'd mentioned earlier, he'd always dodged every bullet so far._

 

_But now, Arthur... Arthur was something else entirely. If Eames would play it smart, he could keep seeing Rachael and hold on to his 'completely average heterosexual, nine-to-five working man' image._

_He'd be able to touch Arthur under his mother's own nose and she'd never know if he made sure to take his time, win Arthur over and maintain her infatuation with him. And, most importantly, it could continue for years until the boy would grow out of his infant beauty. Then Eames could just pack his bags and bugger off._

 

_'The plot is perfect' Eames thought to himself and now didn't even mind the heavy arm thrown over his waist as Rachael spooned him from behind. He had the mother wrapped around his finger and the fatherless son intrigued enough to give him his bloody candy. As if it worked the other way around, like an inside-out novel about pedophilia._

_Eames cringed at the word. Always had and always would. You see, Eames was not a pedophile. The label carried too much spite and left bitterness on everyone's tongue. Eames simply liked boys. But he wasn't a monster. He meant no harm. Truly, he did mean no harm to those pale, wide-eyed, angelic tempters._

 

_Nevertheless, the cocktail of infiltrating mother-and-son, was of a smashing kind, one which would get Eames drunk to a point he'd become an alcoholic, ruin his own life and then die prematurely of liver-damage._

_But, fuck, … what a tasty consumption it'd be._  

* * *

 

 

It was the next morning, Eames suspected, when he fell into absolute adoration with Arthur.

* * *

 

 

_There he was. Seated at the kitchen-island with one foot drawn up on a stool, his chin digging in the knee of the leg he'd wrapped his arms around. There was a prominent pout on his lips and a little scowl wrinkling his forehead. It pained Eames in the most delicate manner to witness the blackness of his hair shimmer and soften underneath the sun-rays protruding kitchen-windows. The curls framed his oval face almost lazily. Tousled and messy and so childishly candid._

_A patch of the beam reflected off Arthur's pale forehead and when he shifted a bit on his seat, his eyes squeezed at the stinging light falling into his eyes. Eyes which had been busy shooting daggers into his mum's back while she unscrewed a glass bottle of milk._

 

_Eames glanced at Arthur when passing him by and the boy seized a pause from glaring in order to blink at him. Eames smiled and Arthur **flushed**._

 

“ _I don't understand what's so bad about oatmeal, Arthur.” Rachael complained, obviously not aware of Eames' presence in the kitchen until she turned around and then yelped with a start. Eames flashed her a grin, taking the bowl of porridge which she'd clutched to her chest to prevent from spilling, and then pecked her on the lips._

 

“ _Not used to men in your kitchen, are you?” He muttered against her lips before pulling back and ignoring her wide, greedy eyes and the love-struck blush on her cheeks. Instead he optioned to turn on his heels to the island behind him and placing Arthur's bowl in front of him. The boy watched him from beneath his lashes, which were dark and long, and Eames stomach dropped a wee bit lower than it already had been._

 

“ _I don't like this.” Arthur muttered, poking the thick oatmeal with his spoon and then glanced towards his mum. Eames watched the dynamic between mother and son, on the look-out for ajar doors or windows which would allow him to sneak into when time was right. And there were many._

 

“ _Arthur, for crying out loud...” Rachael muttered before waving a hand towards Eames._

 

“ _We have a guest, behave for god's sake.” With great flamboyance she heaved a sigh and then swirled back around towards the counter behind her to resume -aggressively so- making coffee. Eames quirked a brow at Arthur and Arthur in turn rolled his eyes._

_Cheeky lad._

 

_It should've been a bit unsettling to note that Rachael -after three months- still did not remember Eames' skin crawled at anything to do with coffee. Nevertheless, sipping from the bitter drink, he couldn't be too upset with the view in front of him._

_His eyes easily glided from Arthur; muttering under his breath and pulling faces after every spoonful of warm oatmeal, to Rachael; even on a Sunday wearing a dress and high heels to match her perfectly maquillaged face and styled hair._

 

_She seemed cold to her son. A kind of tough-love Eames recognized from his own youth, given to him by his father whilst his mum had been smothering him until he'd turned eighteen and they'd basically kicked him to the curb that same day._

_Eames had always received too much or too little, there'd been no in between, no regularity or normalcy._

 

_The indifference which Eames had seen in Rachael early on in their relationship, did not reel in around her own child. And it wasn't the case that she could not love, she most certainly loved her boy -Eames was sure-, but there seemed to be emotional constipation going on._

_Whereas she'd swoon and coo within Eames' presence, she transformed into the infamous Ice Queen around anyone else. It was this unlucky trait of being rude despite your knowledge, about being vain without regret, which she greatly consisted of._

 

_Arthur, on his turn, appeared to be a quiet one, though this could be shyness as well._

_Nonetheless he did not speak a word within the ten minutes which were spent with Rachael babbling to Eames and Eames succeeding only barely to keep his gaze focused on her (though his attention seeped towards the boy at the table continuously)._

 

_It hurt to watch Arthur walk around in the same shirt and shorts he'd been wearing last night, scratching his own head with not much elegance and causing his hair to cowlick into every direction. He dumped his empty bowl in the sink and then left without another word, a permanent scowl decorating his features._

_Rachael did not even seem to notice his departure and only continued rambling at Eames about her sister-in-law who -damn her soul to eternity- had stolen a recipe of hers and walked away with the credit on a family dinner last week._

 

_No matter her nagging, which increased the longer they dated and the more confident she got Eames would put up with her 'obnoxious' side, there was the boy treading in the back of his mind._

 

_And how welcoming it was to have such a charming seducer boot his conscience overboard._

* * *

 

The relation between Rachael and Eames escalated rapidly from that morning on.  
All at once it did not matter as much to be courting a woman who's body would never please him and who's eyes would gawk at him with a love he'd never return.

'T was an effortless coping to be sacrificed in exchange for a desired claim to stake.

 

It wasn't until about two weeks after his first encounter with Arthur, that the boy seemed to drop the little hesitance he'd shown around him.  
No suspicion left, if there even had been. Eames suspected the child to be more shy than he was wary. There wasn't even resentment present within the boy who'd lost his father and now got a twenty-five year old threat shoved into his territory by his mum.

* * *

 

_Eames nearly jumped out of his own skin when Arthur bounced from behind a corner in the hallway upstairs, blocking his path to the bathroom._

 

“ _Hey.” Arthur's smile was shy and did not match his mischievous eyes. His pupils seemed widened by determination set on a goal currently riddled for Eames._

 

“ _Hi, Arthur.” He returned the boy's smile with bared teeth which hid the hurricane of emotions swirling in his stomach. This was the first time being alone in Arthur's presence ever since the midnight-kitchen-happening. His aura was suffocating to the point Eames feared trying to inhale and catch his scent on a choke._

 

“ _Did mom show you around yet?” The question was unexpected to the point where it took Eames a moment to comprehend its meaning. He blinked stupidly, trying to get rid of the voice whining in his head that he was alone **with** Arthur in the hallway! Alone with **Arthur** in the hallway! **Alone with Arthur** -_

 

“ _Hnno.” Eames replied, just barely managing to swallow a groan and then added “She has not.” just to clear his voice and brush off the awkward tone of it._

_Arthur tipped his head sideways, flashing him a grin and Eames wondered how clever this kid actually was as he seemed far too intelligent for his own good._

 

“ _So, you haven't seen my room yet, right?” His voice got a little higher towards the end and Eames watched his almond eyes widen. He wasn't certain if it were because of curiosity or hopefulness. Nevertheless, the question itself kicked him in the gut._

 

“ _Righty-o”. Eames nodded and then heaved a pleased -inaudible- sigh when Arthur reached out to wrap his fingers into the sleeve of his salmon button-up. His feet followed eagerly behind the boy pulling him along through the hallway._

 

_Now, it was an honor of sorts to be showed around in a child's room when mentioned child was at an age and in a parent-lacking situation that would urge for it to desire privacy and prefer stranger-dislike. After all, Eames was still a newcomer to Arthur. In the two weeks of having met him, they'd perhaps seen one another five times and each of those times had gotten accompanied by Rachael and had lacked any conversation between them._

_So yes, Eames did consider it an honor to be showed around in the boy's little, private territory. He ignored the presence of Arthur's bed in the farthest right corner of the room, desperately so._

 

“ _You like cars.” Eames said, poking one of the many miniature vehicles on the second-top shelve of his bookcase. They were as neatly displayed as his books, though rather than color-organized such as the mentioned toys, the literature seemed to follow up alphabetically within genres. Eames' frown got accompanied with a curious smile.  
What a remarkable trait for a nine-year old to be as neat and structured such as Arthur seemed to be._

 

“ _Only red ones.” Arthur replied and when Eames glanced over his shoulder, he witnessed the kid sprawling ungracefully into his wheeled desk-chair, spinning it around a couple of times._

 

“ _Why's that?” Eames asked and then reveled in the unreadable leer Arthur threw him._

 

“ _No reason.” He shrugged and looked away. It was obvious he was lying. Eames could tell not only by the blush on his cheeks but as well by how the left-corner of his mouth had pulled down for a split second, into a beginning grimace before it'd gotten hidden._

_Eames wouldn't prod, though. Far too early for that as 'these things' took patience and a lot of time were you to desire a positive outcome and prolonged road of pleasure._

 

“ _You like books as well?” His fingers stroked the spines of various books on which he'd now turned his gaze to. There were aged ones and new ones, used and ignored, loved and disposed. More than half of them were self-study books; math, science and physics. Another great part consisted of literature about architecture and a couple of Oscar Wilde's and Shakespeare's were stuffed behind others, as if they'd been wanted to get hidden._

 

_Arthur was a bright light, that much Eames felt strongly about, nonetheless it seemed there lacked a childhood which Eames would need to gift to him._

 

“ _Yeah.” Arthur breathed from somewhere behind him and Eames felt his eyes drilling through the back of his skull._

 

“ _Do you like cartoons or films?” With ears focused on Arthur's future reply, he squatted down to inspect the books at the bottom shelves, then smiled at the clutter shoved behind NGC books. 'Not so tidy, after all' Eames thought to himself._

 

“ _I like cartoons... kinda.” Arthur finally replied, intriguing Eames with his slow, thought-through answer._

 

“ _Movies are nice but I don't like sitting still for so long.” This statement got enforced when Eames turned around to watch the boy spin around in his chair, fingers lacking rhythm as they tapped on his thighs._

 

“ _And video-games?” Eames asked._

_Arthur halted abruptly, his chair nearly toppling over if it weren't for his socked foot bracing the weight._

 

“ _Oh~” He sighed, wide-eyed and strangling Eames' heart just by the open expression on his beautiful, little face._

 

“ _I **love** video-games.” Arthur confessed and then his cheeks bloody dimpled. Eames had not seen Arthur smile widely enough just yet to be a witness of the tiny dents in his cheeks and thus hadn't been prepared for the onslaught, at all._

 

“ _Me too. I've got plenty back at my place.” Casually mentioning this truthful fact caused Arthur to exhale another 'oh', this time layered with curiosity rather than awe._

 

“ _Maybe you and your mum should visit some time. I'll buy lots of candy and then we can play games in the dark, with our faces real close to the teli, yea?”_

 

_Arthur nodded excitedly and then bared perfectly-rowed, white ivories in a broad, full-on smile._

_Frankly, the sight round-house kicked Eames in the solar plexus so hard it made him weak to the knees. He folded one hand into a fist to get a hold of himself and then just drowned in the beauty of Arthur's lit up face. Though his teeth were perfect and his eyes squinted to the point it was hard to tell if they were even open in the first place; Eames' favorite 'Arthur-y' thing had to be those ridiculous dimples in his chubby cheeks, dimples which only highlighted the sharpness of his zygomatic bones._

 

_Arthur's beauty was merciless._

 

“ _That'd be so awesome.” He awed before a frown overpowered his smile and he added; “Mom hates video-games though, and candy also. She says one rots the brain and the other the teeth.” Arthur pouted only slightly and Eames joined his sulking._

 

_In the past two weeks he'd gotten to figure out more about Rachael and Arthur's dynamic with one another. Rachael being a bit of a health-freak made it so that Arthur was not to enjoy the edible sins of life (hence why he'd been eating candy-bars in the middle of the night. Candy-bars which, Rachael had scolded, he'd gotten from school). It didn't stop there. Oh no._

_Arthur was also not allowed to watch television or play video-games in their home. She'd said -Eames quoted in his memory- 'I don't care what mayhem you're up to at school or with friends but in my house you're not going to disregard your studies for the sake of being a little, stubborn brat.'_

_That quote had told him three things. One) She did not care what kinds of possible danger Arthur could put himself into at school or with mentioned friends._

_Two) She did not allow him to be a child for the sake of maintaining his grades and not allow him to roll within the temptations of life's stress-relieving entertainment._

_And three) Rachael found no difficulty calling her son names, hence demeaning his being and most likely damaging the boy's self-esteem._

 

_The combination was a killer complexion to have Arthur implode sooner or later. It was not the way to raise a child. It was not the way to treat anyone other than a nemesis and Eames wondered if it did not border upon the edge of child-abuse._

_Nonetheless, there was a defined lack of male-role-model in Arthur's life. A role which Eames would love to take upon himself and be the 'good parent'._

 

“ _Well, then you'll have to come visit me alone, hm? It'll be our little secret.” Eames whispered conspiratorially and Arthur immediately nodded, not a single knick or crook in his face that would display suspicion of being ill-intendedly touched by Eames' hands. Eames did not think Arthur was a naive boy, after all his witty eyes alone would kick that assumption to the curb, but to **him**... well, the boy was unsuspecting._

 

“ _Or you could come live here and we'll do it when mom's at work.” Arthur pondered with a finger to his lips._

_Eames wasn't sure what made his stomach flip more; the fact that Arthur liked the idea of Eames living with them or the cruel innuendo that weighed down the 'it' in his proposition._

 

_Eames did not get a chance to reply for Rachael called 'dinner is ready' from the bottom of the staircase. Arthur rolled his eyes with a bratty sigh tumbling out of his mouth and Eames smirked at him, already leaning towards the 'good cop' part in this family._

* * *

 

_Another week passed and then on a Saturday afternoon, Arthur succeeded in aggravating his mum to the point she **commanded** Eames to just take him somewhere and leave her a couple of hours to clean the place without his nagging. Arthur, granted, had been a proper twat all day._

 

_Eames, by now, had infiltrated their home a bit. He now had his own drawer in the upstairs dresser and a shelve in the bathroom cabinet. Arthur's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle toothbrush made the man smile each time he'd open the mirrored door to withdraw his own -larger- toothbrush._

_He didn't spend every night, but it had gone from Saturdays to Fridays **and** Saturdays and he was aware she'd allow him to stay longer if he wanted to. Rachael did not at all mind that he was domesticating within their single-parented family. And neither did Arthur..._

 

“ _Why do you tease your mum so much, Arthur?” Eames questioned lightly when Arthur and he left the house and now paced towards the car down their street. The gravel of driveways crunched underneath their feet as Arthur preferred to walk on the tiny stones rather than the appointed pedestrian pavement._

_He kicked a bit into the dirt , and with hands dug deep into the pockets of his trousers looked up at the cloudless sky. Eames wasn't sure whether the scowl was meant for the sun's rays or for Eames' question._

 

“ _She annoys me.” Was the simple reply and Eames glanced at him shortly, reading confusion on his face._

 

“ _How?” He asked, digging into his own trouser-pocket in order to retrieve his car-keys._

 

“ _She's too bossy, y'know?” And then “She treats me like a one-year old and like- I'm never allowed to do anything for fun and stuff.” Arthur complained with an honest waver to his voice.  
Eames hummed understandingly before coming to a stop next to his 1996 black Mazda Millenia, a car which apparently made nine-year-old-boys gawk._

 

“ _You like?” Eames smirked as he opened the passenger door._

 

“ _It's awesome.” Arthur mumbled before sliding into the seat. It was deeply unsettling to witness how easily he could get this boy in his bloody car when knowing him for less than a month. Not to mention, 't was far more disturbing to witness his mother's indifference to a mid-twenties man taking her little boy out, just the two of them, alone. It nearly angered him to stand aside and observe the ignorance that flowed within her... but then... this made the hunt that much easier._

_Nonetheless, it struck him as odd for a parent to leave their child with -basically- a stranger, because how well would you know a person in just four months? Obviously not well enough._

_Rachael did not even so much as consider that Eames could harm her boy and Eames would. He would harm Arthur sooner or later, no matter the good intentions leading up to the heinous act._

 

_Eames watched him. Observed how the boy ran his fingers over the leather of his seat with a soft smile playing on his lips. He was so open, so vulnerable... He was so carefree within Eames' presence it would've made him feel guilty to want to do the things he craved to do to- and with Arthur. But he knew better... He'd been here before. And guilt never triumphed his perverse hunger._

 

_As he gently closed the door and then rounded the vehicle, he thought of how Arthur would never stand a chance to get out of this. His young life had already been cracked at the seams by the fatherless life lived amongst a mother whom had so many issues of her own she was not able to bond with her own child, let alone give him the protection he so much needed._

_He was only a child and Eames found no resistance into tearing wider apart the already cracked walls of a smooth, honest future. He shouldnot but he did. He'd already started to peel at the flaking paint and witnessing the purity underneath... how could he ever stop himself?_

 

“ _Mr. Eames, are you okay?” Arthur's soft voice broke through the raging storm in his head and with a smile he loosened the white-knuckled grip on his steering-wheel._

 

“ _Absolutely, Arthur. Would you like to get some ice cream?”_

 

_Arthur's eyes went from hesitant worry to rebellious delight._

 

“ _Mom's not gonna like that.” His words lacked actual consideration and Eames just winked at him._

 

“ _No tell, no harm.” Eames drawled before he went to buckle his seatbelt. Arthur followed the example and smiled to himself._

 

“ _This is awesome.” The word seemed to be one of Arthur's favorites to use in Eames' presence. He didn't mind the overuse of it for the simple fact that he adored how the boy's American tongue wrapped itself around the 'aw', lilting almost awkwardly._

 

“ _You are awesome.” He shyly added when the car got put into first gear and then crept out of the tight parking spot._

_Eames' heart skipped several beats and he threw a smile at the boy, though he'd by now turned away his face, most likely to hide the profound blush on it._

 

_Oh, Arthur did not stand a chance in this life, not anymore... not since Eames had strolled along.  
It was a sad story for one, but a fantastically lewd tale for the other._

* * *

 

_They detoured towards a supermarket before going for ice cream. The grocery-shopping experience (in which Eames completely forgot to buy the eggs Rachael had asked of him earlier today) existed out of ten percent actual shopping and ninety percent gasping and awing in the toy aisle._

 

_Arthur liked boy stuff, regardless of what the books and clean state of his room might've claimed before._

 

_He liked the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the X-Men and something about monsters and battles of which Eames had never even heard of. Arthur as well, was pretty far-gone over Batman._

_Farther down the aisle they ogled and grabbed video-games, salivating over covers and reading the backs with excitement. Arthur tugged at Eames' sleeve at one given point and poked a particular video-game case violently. He told him, straight after, that he'd played the game (Tekken) at school once, when kids had been allowed to bring along their favorite toy. After that one time he'd never been able to play it anymore and he still claimed it was his most loved video-game ever, ever, **ever**!_

 

_Eames wasn't sure whether to appreciate or grief the pout on Arthur's lips._

 

_He stood close to him; Arthur to Eames, not the other way around, and the boy tipped his head a bit sideways in a subtle motion that brought him physically closer to the older male. Eames was suspiciously well-talented at reading body-language and thus he knew it'd be safe to plant a soft hand on Arthur's shoulder and squeeze it._

_His skin was searing hot, even through the fabric of his red teeshirt, and he had to gulp various times before he calmed down the heated knot in his stomach._

 

“ _I'll have a word with your mum some time.” He whispered sneakily next to Arthur's ear, bending over to meet him at his shorter level. Arthur physically bit back a smile with digging little teeth into his lower lip, before he discarded the video-game he'd been clutching to his chest back into the container in front of them. Eames' hand rolled off his bony shoulder at the movement, heavily and regretfully._

 

_They did leave with a Batman figurine and a few candy-bars which Arthur promised to hide under his bed. Afterwards they went for ice cream, as promised. Arthur picked a scoop of vanilla on top of a cone (the color of which seemed dodgy unless you found green ice cream cones not worrisome)._

_The path back to his car was paced slowly in order to grant Arthur time to finish his eleven AM dessert. It was atrociously difficult to not watch him eat and Eames made sure to keep conversation flowing so he could -subtly- rest his eyes on Arthur's mouth._

_He only looked away from that bright-pink tongue scooping white cream in slow, leisurely swipes, when fellow pedestrians would cross their path. Eames' heart pounded, not only by the wrongful arousal prickling his skin from top to toe but as well with concern of people **seeing** what was going on behind the picture._

_But no one did._

_On the contrary, a couple of ladies appeared to be thoroughly endeared as they presumed Eames to be Arthur's father, treating him an ice cream on a sunny Saturday._

 

_There was a cruel satisfaction that went hand-in-hand with fooling outsiders. Eames experienced sickening pride to have others believe he was merely this boy's father or perhaps his older brother._

_No one, **not a single soul** , suspected that underneath the portrait laid a rotten base which eventually and inevitably would stain the picture above. Ruin it entirely._

 

 _Eames metaphorically laughed in his sleeve and then, when Arthur bit down cruelly on his cone; the crunching sound and the implication of teeth tearing through phallus-shaped objects clear to the senses; he finally snapped out of his own mind and was able to drive them home safely._  

* * *

 

Now, a few aspects about Arthur and Eames' past together, would never be forgotten by the latter of the pair.

Some of those more inappropriate than others, nevertheless worth to- _important_ to be mentioned.

Following the time-line of their relationship, one of the first cherished memories Eames recalled was the joy Arthur had expressed when receiving the news that he would move in with him and his mum.

* * *

 

_A nudge against his leg was what woke Eames from his daydreaming; images of sweaty pale skin and trembling muscles beneath. With a frown he looked up from his dinner plate and cocked an eyebrow at Rachael across of him, who'd also been his assaulter just now._

_Rachael as well possessed a set of well-shaped and expressive brows such as Eames did and thus easily communicated with him. She flickered her eyes to the right and Eames followed her not-so-subtle directing._

 

_The annoyance with his girlfriend melted somewhere in the back of his mind, in an unimportant corner where he could swipe tiresome aspects underneath a carpet, when resting his sight upon Arthur._

_His long fingers were twirling a fork into the mashed potatoes and his chin lazily rested upon a hand, elbow on the table. For all that Rachael would nag about healthy food and studying hard (the kid was bloody nine years old, why the hell should he be studying like an architect-in-making at a time his childhood should be enjoyed fully before responsibility and obligations would boot him in the groin?) she never seemed to have taught him any table manners._

_Not that Eames objected. On the contrary, he did enjoy the boy's lazy body-language, limbs always spread about carelessly._

 

_Eames flicked a pea onto Arthur's plate which made Rachael scoff and the boy jolt from his own daydreaming. His face carried a cheeky expression when he looked up at Eames which on its turn caused the man to grin._

 

“ _'Ello. Question.” He began with a dull smile, then took a moment to appreciate the impatient curiosity in Arthur's large brown eyes, making them sharpen and gleam._

 

“ _Yeah?”_

 

“ _How would you feel if I were to move in with you and your mum?” Eames questioned and noted in his peripheral vision that Rachael stirred; unhappy about his straight-to-the-point tactic rather than her preferred sugarcoated beating-around-the-bush. That didn't work with men and sometimes neither with boys._

_He second-questioned that statement when Arthur dropped his fork on his -still full- plate and then gaped at him. Leaning back in his seat he could easily observe the both of them and nearly snarled when, as Arthur glanced questionably at his mum, she rolled her eyes condescendingly at him before nodding to assure him Eames wasn't joking. She looked down on him a lot, to a degree that it could be considered prodding the threshold of child-neglect._

 

“ _Like 24/7?” Arthur whispered when his gaze re-focused on Eames' far more receptive face. When he nodded confirmedly he barely found enough time to get over the happy glow framing the boy's smile in order to prepare himself for the physical attack._

_Arthur had gotten up to round the table with rapid determination and the last thing Eames heard before his rushing blood deafened him was the tut of Rachael as she got up from her seat to clean the table._

 

“ _This is so awesome.” Arthur breathed quietly into his ear and the arms around Eames' neck tightened their hold. He gingerly patted the boy on the shoulder, holding his breath and trying desperately to ignore the juvenile prodding of shoulder-blade framed with tight, underdeveloped muscle. His body was so warm... so heated it made him break into a sweat immediately._

 

“ _I'm so happy.” He added. His breath fanned out over Eames' ear and it took an unnerving amount of willpower to not shudder and wrap his arms around the boy's tight, tiny waist._

 

“ _I'm happy when you're happy.” Eames whispered back with a voice void of emotion and eyes focused on Rachael who seemed to pay them no attention, seemed to not even consider how inappropriate it was for a nine-year-old boy to crawl on a not-by-blood-related man's lap._

_The physical closeness was not the only happening that made Eames' mouth run dry and palms sweat. It was the undeniable fact that they were whispering... that **Arthur** was whispering, intentionally keeping his voice down to only be heard by Eames and not his mum. He was being a sneaky boy with Eames, behind his mother's back, and it was that thought alone causing a dangerous fire to ignite within himself._

_This was the first embrace to take place between the two of them. And it was an intense one, even if he wouldn't be sexually attracted to Arthur... the hug would still have been inappropriate for Arthur's knee rested heavily in between Eames' spread legs, nudging against his groin. And then his lips, so close to his ear, it seemed like a bloody snuggle more than anything else._

 

“ _Go finish your dinner, yea?” Eames muttered, his voice was lower and cracked on the last word. Arthur nodded but didn't let go until Eames gently pushed him off. Oblivious to the effect he had on Eames; the boy skipped back to his seat and sat down, digging into his now-cold dinner. There was a blush on his cheeks and a smile curled on the corners of his mouth. He looked absolutely delighted._

 

“ _Well, appears that that's settled then, innit.” Eames smiled, voice loud and confident and unaffected as his words were aimed at Rachael who was making coffee. She glanced over her shoulder with a smitten smile on her full lips and agreed._

 

_Eames left the table a couple of minutes later. Stepping into the bathroom with a heaviness to his limbs that caused his footing to be unsure, he then leaned heavily on the sink, shoulders hunched and head dipped._

_It took him long, very long to face himself in the mirror he knew awaited for him to look up._

 

_When he did, there wasn't a single thing which would ever betray what lied within the mangled brain behind his gray eyes. Eames scowled at his reflection and then splashed water into his face.  
He was fine. He'd be fine. _

 

_Eames was a patient man. He hadn't been in the past, but this time he would. Arthur would come to love him and Eames would come to show him how their love could be acted upon._

* * *

 

_Three weeks later Eames had officially moved in, and another eight days after that he succeeded gracefully in convincing Rachael that video-games truly weren't all that bad._

_'They're brilliant for eye-to-hand-coordination, Love.' or 'Think of the educational games out there that will stimulate his brain and reflexes, Sweetheart.'._

_All in all, he was quite aware that it wasn't the logic that persuaded her in the end, but more so the wooing and the almost literal kissing of her arse._

 

_'T had been worth it, naturally, for he now was able to smother Arthur with more presents than the candy he'd buy and sneak into his hand behind his mum's back. It always made him grin bare his little ivories and in turn Eames' chest seemed to implode. Sweet, sweet agony._

 

_Speaking of candy, Eames got up from his seat and pulled Arthur's bowl of muesli out of his hands._

 

“ _H-hey.” He frowned and Eames returned him a cheeky grin. He discarded the porcelain in the sink and then reached up to one of the overhead cabinets._

_Arthur's mum had already left to work, granting Eames precious alone time with Arthur such as happened every Wednesday. Unlike himself, Rachael worked Monday to Friday, whereas he earned money on every day of the week except this one. And by some sick, coincidental alignment of the stars, Arthur only had to attend school for three hours on these mentioned Wednesdays, granting Eames his alone-time with the boy for five and a bit hours before Rachael would get home from work._

 

_Humming a tune which didn't even belong to an existent song, Eames took out the box of Cocoa Puffs and watched Arthur's eyes widen when he glanced over his shoulder at him._

 

“ _Those are for Sundays only, though.” He murmured with not much of a fight in his voice, allowing the whisper to sound far more hopeful than it did guilty._

 

“ _Tut tut.” Eames frowned and then smirked teasingly at Arthur who, after he was certain the man was being serious, grinned right back at him._

 

“ _We're going shopping today, you and I.” Eames spoke over the noise when the little puffs collided against porcelain as he poured them in._

 

“ _Grocery shopping?” Arthur's voice lilted into suspicion, even at his young age he was able to catch the cryptic tone to Eames' words._

_Eames smiled, turning around and placing the bowl in front of Arthur. He watched the boy get distracted by the prospect of 'forbidden' foods, easily so. His dark eyes went a bit wide and a tongue clamped between teeth as he grabbed the large and heavy container of milk in both hands, pouring milk, carefully, over the cereals._

 

“ _You'll see.” Eames murmured, observing how the boy fisted his spoon rather than hold it between middle- and pointer-finger such as grown-ups would._

_Arthur glared a bit at him as he slurped from his spoon and Eames' smirk only widened, baring his teeth in a wolfish grin which would betray the predator within to someone who'd look much, **much** farther than their nose's length._

 

“ _You're being sneaky, Mr. Eames.” Arthur whispered with feigned annoyance and Eames tipped his head to the side._

 

“ _Oh, am I now?”_

 

“ _Yeah, you're-uh, you're cheeky.” Eames watched the blush spread over Arthur's cheekbones when he snapped his mouth shut after having said that. It was obvious that Eames' dialect was rubbing off on him and more apparent was that Arthur was very much interested in said dialect, trying to impress Eames with his impersonation and then being ashamed when he'd done just so._

 

_That was another thing Eames loved so dearly about these boys. They were **so** bloody naive and so endearingly see-through._

 

_They both froze when hearing the front door open, the sound followed suite by muffled cursing._

 

“ _Seems like your mum's back.” Eames whispered with exaggerated panic laced on his face and around his voice. Arthur outright giggled before it got cut off with a snort and he hastily slid his bowl across the table towards Eames._

_The Brit got up from his seat and just in time he basically threw the bowl of muesli back on the table. Arthur grabbed it with both hands, biting back laughter when Rachael strutted into the kitchen._

 

“ _Have you seen my agenda?” The blonde asked, hands fumbling with an earring she tried to clip on her lobe, a frown on her forehead and eyes flickering over her son. She didn't wait for an answer._

 

“ _For goodness sake, Arthur, get ready for school! You're going to be late!”_

 

“ _I'm not going to be late, mom, **God.** ” Arthur basically cursed and when Eames peeked over the rim of the bowl hiding his grin, he could see the kid rolling his eyes dramatically behind his mum's back._

_Oh, he was a little brat, alright. But to Eames it was far more endearing than it was obnoxious (such as it undoubtedly was to Rachael)._

 

_Either way, Arthur hopped off his seat and stomped towards the door. With Arthur's mum busy searching everywhere but on the fridge where Eames knew she'd left her agenda, he playfully stuck out a leg in a bluffing attempt to trip Arthur as he passed him by._

_The boy's sulk transformed into a lovely, mischievous grin as he swiftly hopped over Eames' socked foot. He stuck out his tongue, one finger pulling down the skin below his eye to reveal more of his eyeball than was socially appreciated, and then quickly glanced over Eames' shoulder to make sure Rachael hadn't seen anything._

 

_As his eyes fell back onto Eames' face he quickly kicked his foot and then muffled a laugh behind his small hand when Eames dropped his jaw in overly-expressed shock._

_He dashed out of the room straight after, leaving Eames with a fuzzy mind and a numbed sense of agitation when telling Rachael where she'd dropped her agenda. This woman could literally nag both of his ears off and he'd still not give a singly, bloody fuck._

 

_Oh Arthur, Arthur..._

_Cheeky, little Arthur._

* * *

 

_That same day at a quarter past noon, Arthur shoved himself through the front-door, cursing at the doormat which joyfully rolled up as it got stuck beneath the wood. Rather than solve the problem with pausing and removing the mat, Arthur found it more effective to just throw another dozen of curse-words at the inanimate object and shove his shoulder against the door until he could fit his scrawny body through the gap._

_The boy squeezed himself inside and then slammed the door shut before glaring at it for a couple of seconds, as if affronted by his own home._

 

_Bad day at school, Arthur?” Eames smiled, watching Arthur jump in surprise as he surely had not noticed the man's presence in the hallway._

 

“ _No, I was just excited to get home and then that- Are you making pancakes?” Arthur asked with widened eyes before he sniffed the air with great flair, following the scent's path towards the kitchen. Eames smiled and followed him with slouched shoulders and dark eyes._

 

“ _I don't know. Am I?” He teased, fingers splayed between the boy's shoulder-blades. Arthur threw a glance over his shoulder, grinning his perfect teeth bare, not an ounce of him flinching or so much as considering to be suspicious of Eames' touch._

 

“ _You've been sneaky all day, Eames.”_

 

“ _I have.” Eames agreed before urging him into the kitchen._

 

_Eames had indeed made pancakes, as American as he knew them to be (maple-syrup and bloody bacon included. Figuratively 'bloody', that is.), and watched the boy's giddy movements as he hopped onto one of the barstools surrounding the kitchen-island._

 

“ _Oh my god, this looks great, Mr. Eames!” Arthur exclaimed, grabbing a fork and knife in hand, watching closely how Eames poured golden, sticky syrup over the two pancakes on his plate._

_Eames enjoyed how Arthur would often address him with 'mister', as if he wanted to make up for all the times he didn't. Mr. or not, the man was pleased with both ways._

 

“ _Thank you, Arthur. Bacon?” Eames asked, just to be sure, as he held a little bowl with tiny dices of crispy meat._

 

“ _Yeah.” The boy assured hastily and then dug knife and fork into the thick pancakes in front of him, barely allowing Eames enough time to scatter the crumbs over his food._

 

“ _Is this how you eat them in England?” Arthur asked before shoving a heavy, full fork into his mouth. Eames occupied a seat on the barstool across of the kid and took a moment to observe Arthur's puffy cheeks as he chewed far too much food at once._

 

“ _Is this how you eat them here?” The man threw back._

 

“ _Pretty much, yeah. You did a good job.” Arthur muttered around a mouthful of delayed-breakfast._

 

“ _For an Englishman?” Eames teased and Arthur grinned after he swallowed everything down._

 

“ _For an Englishman.” He agreed and then dug back in, hands adorably fisted around the utensils, lips tight with concentration._

 

“ _Our pancakes are a bit thinner. We like lemon and sugar on ours.” The man shared, shamefully confessing to only himself that he preferred the American version, though he was still doubtful about the whole bacon thing._

 

“ _Lemon?” Arthur frowned, his eyes narrowed as if he wasn't sure whether to believe this man or not._

 

“ _Hm-hm. It's the bee's knees.” Eames smirked, enjoying the confusion on the boy's face which he tried to hide so desperately. He was a proud and stubborn little kid and for this alone Eames adored to tease him. Arthur blinked a couple of times at his plate, most likely considering whether to ask what Eames meant, but in the end optioning to just eat and ignore his own curiosity._

 

_Arthur **devoured** five pancakes within twenty minutes and then spent at least half an hour groaning about why Eames hadn't stopped him and then moaning about how he'd explode before the day was over._

_After that, he was ready (and excited) to join Eames on their 'mysterious' shopping spree._

* * *

 

_Arthur figured out what was going on the moment Eames led him through the maze of aisles towards the multimedia section._

 

“ _No way...” He whispered with awe and layered shock as he looked up at Eames._

 

“ _You convinced mom?”_

 

“ _I did.” Eames confirmed with a grin before he nudged Arthur farther towards the shelves of video-games with a hand placed between his sharp shoulder-blades._

 

_To Arthur, this was most likely the best thing to have happened to him in the whole of his young life, so far. Eames witnessed the childish emotion urging tears to spill from his wide eyes. He found it becoming. Only little boys would cry over happiness... Men would not. Only little boys flashed emotions for anyone to see, but then bared deeper layers for those they chose, for those they trusted and loved._

_Arthur bit back his tears, sinking white teeth into his lip as he glanced at Eames and then back at the endless choice of consoles and games in front of them._

 

_It took him very little time before he optioned to get the Play-Station 1 and Tekken 2 along with it._

 

“ _Now I'll be able to play Tekken every day!” Arthur outed excitedly, his voice loud throughout the almost empty store. Eames watched him hug the huge (to him) box against his scrawny chest as they walked towards the checkout._

 

“ _You will, and we'll buy a new game each month.” Eames added, patting Arthur once more on the shoulder, reveling and appreciating the little physical contact he could afford to let slip through the veil of appropriateness._

 

“ _This is so awesome.” The boy whispered, more to himself than to Eames._

 

_When Eames had payed for the console and game, placing them both carefully behind Arthur's seat in the car, the boy then initiated a hug, stopping the man's breath when wrapping long arms around his neck. It was an awkward embrace, what with the gap in between their seats and the gear-lever poking Eames in the gut, and their bodies couldn't quite press together... And surely that was for the better. An unlucky luck._

 

“ _Thank you so, so, **so** much, Mr. Eames. I promise I'll never be bad again.” Arthur whispered, his voice heavy with emotion and Eames had to swallow a sound when the boy planted a firm, dry kiss on his stubbly jaw._

 

“ _You're never a bad boy, Arthur.” He spoke, lacking any creativity to put into the current conversation, his mind dazed and confused. Arthur pulled back with a pout and Eames immediately missed his warmth and scent._

 

“ _Not to you, I aren't.” Arthur muttered with an angry scowl but before Eames could press further upon the topic of his strict mum, Arthur curved his body to peek behind his seat at the box._

_His smile was wide as he once more assured himself that there indeed was a Play-Station in the car with them, to bring along home._

 

_Eames drove a bit more quickly than necessary, maneuvering easily through the light afternoon traffic. With both hands firmly placed upon his steering-wheel, he drowned in the sound of Arthur's beautiful voice, muffled by the Mars-bar he was eating, wording his day at school and whatever it was that young boys loved at that age._

* * *

 

Those were more selfless memories of Eames.

 

Those had been days and momentums where he'd made Arthur happy, thoroughly so. It had been days where he'd gained more of the boy's trust and adoration, if not infatuation. It had been days where he'd nudged Rachael that wee bit more out of the picture.

 

Well... considering that, perhaps it hadn't been that selfless, after all.

 

One of the most selfish memories Eames had of the past seven years, was his first own birthday in the family.

* * *

 

_Eames' birthday was in September, whereas Arthur's took place in February. The man still had trouble recalling in which month Rachael aged, let alone what day._

 

_September fell only half a year after they'd all moved in together. The fact that it had only been a mere six months accentuated the unexpected oddness of what happened next._

 

“ _Happy birthday, daddy!” Arthur squawked out of nowhere as he joyfully hopped from behind the door into the living room. Eames sputtered in his glass of wine and Rachael only scoffed at her son. Neither of them seemed to notice that he'd choked on his drink by Arthur's words rather than his stealth and pounce._

 

“ _Arthur, why aren't you in bed?! It's a school night!” Rachael predictably complained, scowling at her son while pointing over her shoulder at the clock on the wall which pointers notified them all that It was well past eleven._

 

“ _It's alright, Love.” Eames assured her, soothing with hand on her shoulder and a charming smile._

 

“ _No, it's **not** okay, he-”_

 

“ _Look, he's got a present, yea?” Eames interrupted her, agitated by her obnoxious mood, as he pointed at Arthur who still stood in the door-frame, holding a small black box._

_He got up from his seat, smiling at Arthur._

 

“ _I'm sorry, I thought you were asleep.” Arthur murmured to his mum before glancing back at Eames, trying to tell whether or not the man was on his side or not, and would back him up._

 

“ _Oh, so you wanted to sneak downstairs then?” Rachael asked and Eames quickly interrupted her once more, preventing her to explode on the little kid._

 

“ _It's a bit late, innit, Arthur? You can show me tomorrow, yea?” Eames assured Arthur while walking towards him. The boy was pouting quietly, his eyes wide and Eames could tell he was hurt by his mother's outburst._

_Eames hid a grimace, disliking the tough-love Rachael granted her boy... but then, it was the most perfect family-situation for him to win Arthur over._

 

_The boy hesitated when Eames urged him back into the hallway. Nonetheless, when he winked, Arthur finally turned around and walked up the stairs, Eames at his heel._

 

“ _I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be rude.” The boy whispered as they ascended the steps. Eames hummed, squeezing Arthur's bony shoulder for a split second._

 

“ _It's okay, Arthur. Your mum's a bit crabby. Not your fault now, is it?”_

 

“ _I guess not...” Arthur muttered and Eames smiled at him when his eyes shifted to his face._

_They turned a corner and then walked into the boy's bedroom. Eames hesitated at the door, but Arthur seemed distracted as he turned on the bedside lamp and then wiped books off his bed._

 

“ _Can I give it to you now?” He asked as he plopped down on the unmade bed. His eyes big and uncertain and rather hopeful._

_Eames took a deep breath, assuring himself that sitting on the bed with this kid would do no harm. He could do this. It was just a bit of an indulgence, wasn't it? Sit next to Arthur, in the dim light, on the soft mattress and whisper with him._

 

“ _Sure.” Eames replied, voice a bit raspy. He closed the door behind him and sat himself -almost gingerly- down next to him._

_As he fumbled with the present in his lap, Arthur seemed to await Eames' initiative. Therefore, the silence was as much tense as it was layered with anticipation._

 

_Eames blessed his own self-control for disabling him of scooting closer to the boy and -like happened in cliché romance films- throw an arm over his shoulder after a stretch and yawn._

_His room, his bed, smelled delicious. A vulnerable, gentle scent that belonged to Arthur and softened everything about him and anything that he'd touch._

 

“ _I wanted to give it to you when you were alone.” Arthur began after a moment. The volume of his voice was so low that Eames couldn't help but accept the intimacy of it all._

 

“ _Why's that?” He asked and watched as Arthur wiggled his toes on the carpet beneath, tapping them with dull, little thuds._

 

“ _Because,” He frowned, gazing at Eames from the corner of his eye._

 

“ _I'm a little embarrassed about it.” Arthur continued and Eames could tell, even in the dim light, that a blush spread over his cheeks the moment the words had left his lips._

 

“ _You don't ever have to be embarrassed about anything with me, Arthur.”_

 

“ _I'm not... I mean... I don't want mom to see your present.” He glanced up at Eames minutely, his feet wriggling on the carpet, shoulders shimmying. Eames threw him a gentle smile, tipping his head slightly._

 

“ _Well, she's not here and I promise I won't tell.” That promise meant many more things than the boy would ever be able to comprehend, and Eames barely managed to keep the ambiguous tone hidden from the child's fragile ears._

 

_Arthur stayed quiet for a moment and Eames watched how he grew more nervous by the second. His little teeth nipped away at his lower-lip and it was obvious that he once more had chosen to leave initiative in Eames' hands. This was not a problem for the Englishman, however, unfortunately enough, he did thoroughly enjoy triggering a blush on a boy's cheeks. He reveled in how they'd cower in shyness, but never fear... Eames had never been into scaring his boys. He'd had to in the past, but only after the fruit had been plucked, to make sure the feast would remain secret from anyone but himself and the child._

 

“ _I would very much like to see it, Arthur.” Eames assured the boy, his hands folded as his elbows leaned on his knees. His chin dipped into his own shoulder as he glanced at the boy next to him, seated more upright._

 

“ _Really?” His eyes were wide and the soft glow of the night-light made his eyes glossy, as if teary._

 

“ _Of course.”_

 

“ _Okay.” The child nervously exhaled, body bouncing lightly on the mattress as he grew giddy at the prospect of handing over his present to the man he'd come to trust so easily. Again, Eames damned and thanked Rachael for her poor skills at raising her kid._

 

“ _Alright, let's have it then.” Eames excitedly recommended as he shifted onto the bed, sitting in Indian position on the small mattress. Arthur, predictably, followed his example and the Englishman nearly sobbed as their knees touched when they faced each other on the bed._

 

_The boy reached out the black box with both hands, ever polite. His smile appeared coy when combined with eyes gazing through lashes. After sucking in a brave breath; Eames took hold of the present offered to him._

 

_As he undid the knot of the black rope preventing the box of being opened, Eames was very much aware of Arthur's intense and unwavering stare. The boy observed the man's face and his face alone, his big and brown orbs never did shift to glance at Eames' hands or anywhere else for that matter._

_Eames faked an unawareness of the boy's presence, more so his devouring eyes._

 

_When he took off the lid, Arthur inhaled audibly, as excited as Eames._

 

_Within the box lied a thick but small book. The cover was black and when Eames brushed a finger over it, he recognized the softness of its leather. Centered on the front were golden numbers forming years; 1997 – 1998._

_It was a very basic yet rather neat agenda._

 

“ _This is very beautiful, Arthur.” Eames smiled down at the book, still brushing a finger over it as if it would indirectly touch the boy who'd held it earlier._

 

“ _Open it.” Arthur whispered quickly but quietly. A conspiratorial excitement laced with anxiety._

 

_Eames obeyed, turning the front to look inside of the book on his lap. Arthur wriggled, knobby knees brushing against Eames' solid and far-larger ones. His fingers took turns at folding into fists or grabbing hands-full of his pyjama bottoms._

 

_God, he loved him nervous._

 

_The first page was blank but for the message written across the center of it. Arthur's hand-writing was surprisingly neat for a boy his age. The lines were straight and the loops small, every curl of every world so thoughtfully written down that it screamed 'control-freak in the making'._

 

_'thank you for the PS1_

_and the pancakes_

_your awesome_

_when im older i wanna learn british curs words'_

 

_Eames melted more with every grammatic error he came across. A few lines lower there was another sentence, written more shyly with letters so small it appeared Arthur had not wanted for Eames to be able to read them but had still felt a self-induced pressure to share whatever message it was._

 

_'thank you for being here'_

 

_It was an oddly deep expression. Eames' heart thumped high enough to leap out of his throat. He'd never expected Arthur and his' relationship would've ever become this good this soon. The man had never felt more welcome to a child's arms. He wanted to blanket Arthur's body, breathe his scent for hours, nuzzle his hair and kiss his throat. For a split second he wanted it all, everything, right there and then. Arthur's voice interrupted his immoral thoughts._

 

“ _I-uh. I wrote a message on every Monday. I, like, tried to write one for every day but it was too hard so I just did the Mondays because they are stupidest day of the week and you can look at your plans and read my stuff and you'll be happy.” He rambled the words quickly, stuttering._

_Eames frowned for a second._

 

“ _Do you think I am not happy, Arthur?” Eames asked, leaving one hand splayed on the agenda's first page before he looked up to meet the boy's eye. Arthur was gnawing on his lower lip, glancing away every other second._

 

“ _Well, no, but-uhm... You work a lot and like, sometimes I see you frown or like, you will sigh at mom and stuff and I guessed that-uhm, well, that even if you look happy all day that maybe, perhaps, inside you are sad or something.”_

 

_Eames didn't reply, just stared at him with a blank face as his heart and stomach waged a war against his conscience._

_Nervousness led Arthur to ramble and this was something the Englishman would keep in mind forever._

 

“ _Maybe, like, you need compliments and jokes to make you happy inside.”_

 

_Though it was the boy who was blushing profoundly, Eames doubted Arthur was more affected by the confession than he himself was. The man licked his lips, mouth dry. The bed seemed to swallow him as he grew heavier in love._

 

“ _You are a very intelligent young man, Arthur.” Eames chose his words carefully as he complimented the boy and afterwards waited for the child to collect enough courage to meet his gaze, dead-on. All boys enjoyed being addressed in a fashion which hinted at their age being older than that of a child. Eames knew this, had experience with this, and hence worded 'young man' rather than just 'boy'._

 

“ _This is very, very thoughtful of you. I truly appreciate this, Arthur.” Eames began, trying to ignore how the kid grew redder and redder, like a fruit that was ripening with the second and Eames hadn't eaten in years. He was so ripe... So bloody ready to be plucked away and to be eaten up._

 

“ _However, please do know it is not your job to take care of me, alright?” His voice was soft as were his eyes, nonetheless Arthur's face fell as he expected to be scolded. Eames quickly continued to wipe that fear off the table and off the child's face. He never wanted the boy to doubt him, never wanted him to look so scared and unsure of himself in front of him, because of him._

 

“ _I am fine, Arthur. Grown-ups sigh and frown sometimes, but I am a happy man and you made me even happier now, yea?” Eames leaned a bit forward, making sure to keep his hands on his own knees. Arthur nodded, still unsure about whether or not he'd made a mistake and had upset Eames._

 

“ _Oi, I'm proper chuffed, me.” He grinned, watching the boy frown playfully such as he always did when Eames used words he did not understand._

 

“ _Promise me you'll not worry about me.”_

 

_Arthur sucked his bottom-lip between his teeth, suckling at it as if seeking comfort before releasing it to clench his jaws. His lips were shiny wet, his eyes failed to meet Eames'. There was more to this. It hung in the air, thick and smothering and Eames wanted it out._

 

“ _Can you promise me that?” He tried again. Arthur shook his head quickly, a strand of pitch-black hair falling onto his forehead. Eames clenched his hands into fists to prevent himself from stroking it away._

 

“ _I can't.” His voice was small._

 

“ _Why's that?” Ever patient for the child to find his words, Eames let his eyes travel down the kid's small torso hidden under the fabric of his night-shirt. The hands in the boy's lap were fidgeting, index-finger of his right-hand trying to peel at the nail of his left-thumb._

 

“ _It's just that-” He looked around for a second, as if seeing his own bed-room for the first time._

“ _You're the first boyfriend living with mom after dad and dad left because he was sad, so, I don't want you to be sad and you know-” He looked up, at last and Eames felt a pang in his chest at the worried expression on the boy's face. He looked even younger at that very moment, hopelessly vulnerable. However still, his large eyes appeared too knowing, too rational for his age._

“ _-leave us, or something.” The child concluded._

 

“ _Your dad left because he was sad?” As far as Eames was aware, Arthur's father had passed away in a car-accident. He could not quite see how this had to do with sadness. Perhaps Rachael had lied to her son. Either way, a piece of the puzzle was missing._

_Arthur nodded and Eames watched his chin wobble, his eyes water._

 

“ _He- I remember he was sad.” Arthur spoke carefully, his voice uneven. Eames wondered how much memory of his father was left. After all, he'd been about five to six years old at that time. Nonetheless, a parent's death left an impression, even if they'd never been in your life to begin with._

 

“ _Was your daddy crying?” Eames asked._

_Arthur nodded again, taking a deep breath and swallowing loudly._

 

“ _He said he was fine, just like you said that, and- and then he left and he never came back ever.”_

 

_Eames grimaced, blanching when Arthur began to cry. He'd never seen him sad. The Englishman had only witnessed the child being either playful or grumpy... But never like this, never with tears streaming down his cheeks and with a chest contracting as he hiccuped through his sobbing._

 

_'Fuck.' He was too frightened to reach out and touch the child, so he maintained, frozen, staring at the boy wiping sleeves across his cheeks._

 

“ _He said he was fine but he wasn't. Grown-ups lie all the time.” Arthur accused, angry and scared simultaneously and Eames realized the child was expecting of Eames to be leaving him one day like his father had._

 

“ _Arthur.” Eames hushed the boy, carefully reaching out a hand and laying it awkwardly on the kid's shoulder. His heart leaped when the boy's cheek immediately nestled itself against the back of his hand. His skin was hot and wet with blood and tears._

 

“ _Mom told me he killed himself because he wasn't happy and-” Eames failed to listen as his ears suddenly shut out any sounds surrounding him in order to focus on the fact that Arthur's father had committed suicide. Bloody hell._

_Had his mother told him this in such brutal manner? Had she just shared this information inbetween breakfast and leaving to work? Had she sat down with him and explained to him what his father's death had been about? Had she shut her boy off from reality, denied herself to grieve, denied Arthur to grieve and comprehend? Had she left the child to wither on himself until all that had been able to bloom from it was guilt?_

 

_The answer was immediate._

 

“ _I should've been good.” Arthur sobbed, wiping his nose with his sleeve but never removing his cheek from Eames' hand. This was too much for a child to handle. This boy had been scarred already and Eames desired dearly to patch him right back up, never mind the fact that eventually he'd be tearing this child to pieces himself._

 

_Oh Arthur..._

 

“ _Hey, shhh, it's not your fault, Arthur. It's not your fault at all, sweetheart.” Eames allowed the endearment to spill. His thumb brushed over the child's collar-bone._

 

“ _You were the light of his life. You have nothing to do with his sadness, alright?” As the boy sobbed on, Eames shook his shoulder gently, tipping his head side-ways as he removed the present out of his lap onto the mattress._

 

_Though he was worried for the boy, genuinely grieving for him, the predator within him still recognized the opportunity in this weak moment. His hand stroked from the kid's bony shoulder to the slender nape of his neck, the movement natural and automatic._

 

“ _Come here.” He whispered, pulling him closer so gently the pressure would hardly be noticeable. Arthur exhaled a dry sob, looking up through his bangs and Eames felt himself crumble when confronted with the redness of the boy's face, the shine of his tears, the puffy eyes and nose, the grimace on his lips._

_He felt as sad as he did enticed._

 

_Eames patted his thigh with his free hand, watching the boy's eyes follow the movement before at last he uncurled his long limbs and crawled into his lap. His breath ceased its pattern of in- and exhaling as the child wrapped arms around his neck, pressing close to his much larger body. He groaned quietly as his face got buried into the mass of black waves on the boy's scalp. The moment Arthur wrapped his legs around the man's waist; Eames was in heaven.  
He was light as a feather, strikingly hot and smelled of children-shampoo and that scent only pre-teen boys produced. Eames grew hard within minutes of listening to the boy's muffled sobs into his shoulder, feeling his body shake as his rib-cage spasmed. He wondered for how long Arthur had not cried, he also thought about how thankful he was for wearing sturdy jeans preventing his arousal to poke up and brush against the child's arse. _

 

“ _It's okay, it's okay.” Eames repeated softly, stroking a hand over the back of the boy's neck as one of his arms cradled the child more tightly against him, reveling in the physical contact._

 

“ _Please be happy.” Arthur murmured into Eames' shoulder, the fabric of his teeshirt moist by tears, snot and exhaled oxygen._

_Perhaps that had been the moment in which Eames had decided he'd not leave Arthur's side, no matter what age. Though he knew he'd no longer be physically attracted to the child once he'd reach middle-adolescence, Eames was too smitten at that moment to so much as comprehend not having this human being in his life, near to him._

_He felt an urge to care for him, protect him, hold him and then make love to him._

 

_Eames had never felt this strongly for a child. Surely he'd fallen in love with kids before, always did in a fast and unforgiving fashion, but Arthur... Arthur was something else entirely. The boy had a hold on his heart and he'd been suffocating it since the moment Eames had walked into that kitchen where they'd first met. If anyone, Eames was the victim here._

 

“ _Arthur, sometimes people are born with sadness.” Eames murmured into the child's hair, inhaling deeply. Arthur tightened his grip on him, fingertips digging into Eames' shoulders._

“ _And that kind of sadness is different from those that you and I have. Our kind can grow but can vanish just as quick. We can be happy, angry, sad and all these emotions are healthy to experience.”_

_Arthur remained silent except for a sniffle every now and then. His body had relaxed slightly, his weight just a tad heavier but slotting even more comfortably against Eames' chest._

 

“ _The sadness your father had was the kind one gets born with. It grows with one's age. And it has nothing to do with angry mothers or naughty sons.” Eames assured the child in his arms, closing his eyes and holding him more firmly, reveling in how Arthur seemed to enjoy the physical contact at least half as much as he himself did._

_He trusted him already, had no suspicion about this Englishman who was so much bigger and stronger than him. Arthur **needed** a father-figure in his life. He needed it as much as he did oxygen._

 

“ _See, Arthur,-” Eames pulled back a little and the boy took the hint as he lifted his face from his shoulder and met his gaze dead-on. Unabashed and so very, bloody hopeful._

“ _-your father had the most beautiful wife and loved her dearly. And your father had the most amazing, adorable, kindest and smartest little boy any father could ever wish for.”  
Arthur's lips quirked into the tiniest of smiles._

 

“ _It is not your fault, it is not your mother's fault, it isn't anyone's fault. He loved you with all his heart, I am convinced of this, and I'm sure he is looking over you right now.”_

 

_The child looked around for a second before meeting Eames' gaze and whispering;  
“Do you think so?”_

 

_Eames' white lie was necessary at that moment. The man was pretty convinced there were no such things as angels for if there were... Well, Arthur's father would've struck him with lightning by now, most certainly, that is if God hadn't beaten him to it._

 

“ _Yeah, definitely, Arthur. And do you think your father would want to see you sad?”_

 

_Arthur legitimately thought about this, his tears gone, eyes still red._

 

“ _No.” He replied with a tiny frown creasing his pale forehead. Eames shook his head with a smile, repeating the boy's answer._

 

“ _If I were your father I would want you to be very happy, all of the time.”_

 

_The boy blushed at the comment, leaning back in and embracing Eames to -not so subtly- hide his face in his shoulder once again._

 

“ _I'd very much like that.” His voice murmured, lips moving against the fabric of Eames' shirt. He shuddered under the boy, taken aback by the comment._

_He smelled so bloody good, his body blood-hot in his arms, his weight childishly light and his grip surprisingly firm and determined. Eames' tongue had gone dry ages ago, his palms were covered with a sheen of cold sweat._

 

_The fact that the child did already see him as a second daddy of sorts, meant that Eames was being torn between wanting to be his guardian and his predator at the same time. Though he'd been in love with boys before, Eames had only been kind and protective to gain their trust and then he'd touched them soon after, using fear and guilt to keep them quiet._

_However, Arthur...  
One side of Eames wanted to raise him into a fine young man, into a man unlike Eames himself. The other side wanted to ravish this child, eat his skin and his bones and ruthlessly fuck his tiny body into the next week. It was difficult to tell whether or not his urge to protect the child was poisoned with the desire to gain his trust. He wanted to take advantage of moments like these, but he kept stopping himself every time again._

_Arthur would be ready one day but Eames wanted him to ready to the point of consent. He wanted to make love to this child every day for years to come and never see him cry or see his love and trust in Eames crumble._

_You see, the man was absolutely frightened to disappoint this boy's expectations, which was something new entirely._

 

_A stab in his skull promised Eames a sleepless night of headaches and paradoxes._

 

“ _Do you believe me Arthur? When I tell you it is not your fault and you have all the right to be a happy boy? Do you trust me to be telling you the truth?”_

 

_Arthur, again, tightened his hold on the larger man, wriggling closer even. One of the Englishman's large hands stroked from the back of the kid's head down over his nape towards inbetween his shoulder-blades. The child moved with the stroke like a feline and it took Eames' breath away._

 

“ _Yes.” He replied quietly and this simple word alone held so much promise it caused Eames' world to explode into a pink cloud of indulgence that blinded the earth from conscience and morals._

 

“ _It's not your fault, Arthur. It never was and it never will be your fault.”_

 

_Whether or not the latter part of his consolation had been about future grief for Arthur's father or future assault from Eames himself, he wasn't sure of and even less so was he convinced about which option he preferred._

 

_It was various minutes later before Eames felt as if he was burning from the inside out. The child's affection was of a stifling heat and to prevent himself from doing something stupid like mouthing at the boy's throat, Eames loosened his grip and started to peel the boy's arms off of him._

 

“ _Don't leave me.” Arthur whispered in a hurried hush, his eyes wide and mouth agape. He resembled a startled animal, perhaps a deer in headlights. Eames allowed himself to quickly brush the child's cheek as he shuffled off his lap._

 

“ _Never.” The Englishman assured him, smiling wide and gentle._

 

_Arthur's demeanor flipped around immediately and drastically such as often happened with children only. One moment they'd be crying, the next they'd be playing. Arthur was no different, intelligence and childhood trauma aside._

_Eames dropped his jaw as if absolutely shocked when the boy started to nudge his knee with a small, bare foot._

 

“ _Promise.” He mumbled, leaning back on his hands, and with his chin dipped to his chest Arthur resembled a very coy, seductive specimen. With his skinny legs sprawled out so wide, Eames couldn't prevent himself from doing a double-take but he swallowed down the longing and kept smiling as if he wasn't absolutely pining to touch every inch of him._

 

“ _Cheeky git.” He insulted him lightly as Arthur kept kicking him gently against his knee. Eames moved with the nudging in over-the-top fashion as if he was about to tip off the bed any second now, and the boy laughed, recognizing the dramatization._

 

“ _Promise.” He commanded once more, using both feet to press against Eames' shin. He had lovely feet, tiny and pale and hairless. The man continued playing dumb, pulling confused faces as he swayed on the bed._

 

“ _Promise what?”_

 

“ _Promise!” Arthur laughed._

 

“ _Promise what? Whatever are you talking about?” Eames grinned widely, delighted to see the red on the kid's face turn from that of grief to an excited blush. Long fingers wrapped gently around an ankle and Arthur's jaw dropped as he foresaw the man's plotting._

 

“ _No, no, please.”_

 

“ _No what? I'm not doing anything.” Eames teased some more before breaking the giggly tension by tickling one of Arthur's feet, resulting in the boy laughing loud and high, kicking and flailing limbs._

_He tried to tug his leg away from Eames' grasp and the man's stomach churned at the realization of how little strength it took from him to keep a hold on the boy. His ankle was bony and narrow and if fingers could bend that way, he'd be able to wrap them around twice._

 

_Their little game continued for a few more seconds before Eames showed mercy and allowed the boy to flop back on the bed, panting as he stared up at the ceiling, his heavy breaths interrupted with a chuckle every now and then._

 

“ _Time for bed.” Eames spoke as he rose to his feet, taking his present with him._

 

_Arthur obediently kicked the blankets from underneath his legs before pulling them up to his chin. His eyes were wide as he looked up at Eames who stood; towering over him._

 

“ _Promise.” The child whispered and Eames was in awe of how determined the kid was, of how he clung to something he craved, not letting go or allowing himself to be distracted and blind-sighted._

 

“ _I promise.” He assured Arthur before turning on his heel and going to leave the room and its smothering atmosphere._

 

“ _Eames?” Arthur called when Eames had flicked off the lights and rested a hand on the door's knob. He turned around, standing in the middle of the opened passage-way._

 

“ _Yeah?”_

 

“ _Were you upset when I called you daddy?” His voice was small and shy. Eames swallowed down the dry tightness in his throat, tilting his head a bit to the side as he observed the boy who only had his eyes peek over the blanket's edge. Two small fists secured the duvet's position, tiny fingers framing his cheekbones._

_Eames' heart ached._

 

“ _No.” He whispered back to him.  
“No... Not at all, Arthur. Not at all.”_

 

_A pause lingered straight after before Arthur nodded to himself as if having decided upon something in his tiny brain._

 

“ _Goodnight, Eames.” He gently wished, shuffling around until cradled on his right-side, curled into a tiny ball, a tiny lump in the huge bed._

 

_Eames smiled, gripping the agenda more tightly._

_Before he closed the door of Arthur's bedroom, Eames noted how the hallway's light caused his shadow to fall over the boy, as if it knew what kind of man he was and what kind of devouring fate awaited the unaware child.  
It was almost an eerie sight to see his room illuminated so mellowly, yet have a darkness seeping over the bed._

 

_However, with the door closed, the boy was secluded safe and sound and away from the predator in his home. For now at the least, Eames was as grateful for his self-control as he was annoyed by it._

 

_Later that night he fucked Rachael into next week and yet still sleep did not grant him peace of mind, no matter his exhaustion; physically and more so emotionally._

_For the second time that particular day, he felt more like Arthur's victim than he did his predator._

* * *

 

 


End file.
